Paint colors often are displayed on color swatches mounted on flat planar bases for the display of color. Displaying the true color of paint has been a problem and has created an expense of labor and materials. For example, most color cards are not painted with the actual paint sold to the consumer who is selecting the paint and its color. Instead, the color card manufacturer makes a special coating composition which then is color matched to the paint being sold to the consumer by the paint manufacturer. Typically, use of a manufacturer's paint would cause blocking. Blocking causes the surface of the paint on a paint coated chip to stick to materials over laid onto the surface of the paint. Formulating a color matched special paint for color cards creates costs for preparation of the special coating composition, plus costs caused by the necessity of color matching the special coating composition with the actual paint being made by the paint manufacturer and sold to the consumer.
Those who apply metallic or special effects paint, such as automobile manufacturers, often spray metallic paint onto a substrate. These users of metallic and glossy paint have marketing concerns about their color cards including how paint is applied to the chip or swatch to render the appearance of a paint coating on the paint chip identical to the paint on a substrate such as an automobile. To address such concerns, some manufactures of color cards have sprayed paint onto a paper base and then applied clear coat over the paint coatings. This method apparently has required multiple paint coats, such as three or even more paint coats, plus an additional clear coat. This method is expensive by virtue of labor and materials.
Using a spray to apply metallic paint, if it could be done efficiently, would provide significant advantages to a color card maker and paint manufacturer. First, it would provide an opportunity to use the customers paint and reduce color matching problems. Using the customer's paint also would reduce formulation costs for the special coating compositions which historically have been used by color card manufacturers. But if the metallic paint is sprayed, heretofore large amounts of paint have been lost to atomization of the paint into the atmosphere. Moreover if possible, the number of coats of paint used should be reduced to use less paint and make the process more economical.
Knife over roll coaters and roller roller coaters have been used by color card manufacturers to apply pigmented coatings to a web for later use in the manufacture of color display devices. As seen in FIG. 1, with knife over roll coaters, the liquid pigmented coating is applied onto a web upstream of a knife. The knife spreads and thins the liquid pigmented coating onto the web. In a roller roller coater, the liquid pigmented coating is spread on a roller, which then applies the liquid pigmented coating onto the surface of a second roller, or series of rollers, the last of which applies the liquid pigmented coating to a web. As seen in FIG. 2, with roller roller coaters, a pigmented coating is applied to a first roller which spreads and applies liquid pigmented material to one or more downstream rollers, the last of which applies a pigmented coating to a web.
As can be seen by reference to U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,379,696, and 4,457,718 and United States Patent Application Publication US 2003/0072907, now allowed, color card manufacturers also have coated films, such as polyethylene terephthalate and polypropylene, with liquid pigmented coatings to manufacture color cards. These operations, however, did not address the problem of the spray application of metallic or special effects pigmented paint, or the use of a spray in connection with the application of the metallic paint. Nor did the methods described in these patents address the problem of economically using a spray painting technique to make color display products such as color cards.